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Updated March 11th, 2021 at 20:43 IST

Soprano singer helps out in Kosovo clinic by day

After taking care of her father when he had COVID-19, a Kosovar soprano singer has continued to assist medical staff in treating coronavirus patients at a hospital in Pristina.

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After taking care of her father when he had COVID-19, a Kosovar soprano singer has continued to assist medical staff in treating coronavirus patients at a hospital in Pristina.

The 32 year-old soprano took it upon herself to treat her father Baki Bashari - the Kosovo Philharmonic's maestro who suffers from diabetes and a heart ailment -  after she discharged him last June from the country's overwhelmed Pulmonological Clinic.

When her father had recovered, Jashari resolved to help by donning protective gear and heading back to the Pulmonological Clinic to offer whatever kind of assistance she could.

"You give them hope when you are around. They know that you are here to help. They ask for help," she told The Associated Press.

Jashari has no medical training, but assisted doctors in any way was needed, offering succor to those suffering either at the clinic or at home.

For those patients recovering at home, she would often act as a liaison between them and doctors, even guiding nurses to some who needed hands-on treatment.

Flamur Marku, a pulmonologist at the clinic, said he admires Jashari for risking her own heath to give some comfort to those who are suffering, adding that at first it was "hard to understand why somebody is risking her health, risking to get infected by the corona virus."

Jashari herself says that she never had second thoughts about her decision, despite the danger of being infected with coronavirus.

"Seeing hope in people's eyes - that's my main thing that brings me here all the time", she says.

In the evenings, Jashari takes off her hazmat suit and gets ready to perform with The Kosovo Philharmonic, which is allowed to hold concerts with a limited number of spectators.

Jashari graduated from the universities of Pristina, Berlin and Ljubljana after studying singing. The apple didn't fall far from the tree - Jashari's mother is also a soprano.

A concert in late February was among the very few held over the last year because of the pandemic.

Jashari said she misses the intensity of a full season of of concerts which are now held mostly online or with a very limited audience.

She insists that volunteering in the hospital and performing live for audiences has more in common than many would imagine.

Both, she says, give ''so much hope and emotions.''

''Normal for me is now singing here in front of a crowd of 20 people or in front of the cameras and then just running back to the hospital wearing all that gear and just being there for the patients", she says.

Kosovo has recorded more than 71,000 cases of the coronavirus and more than 1,600 deaths.

The country has not yet started its vaccination campaign.

 

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Published March 11th, 2021 at 20:43 IST

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